Arma 2: Operation Arrowhead Performance

Coxey

New member
Yello'

I've had my Arma 2 for a long time now, but only recently have I really been getting into it with a few friends. I was wondering what's the dominating factor for Arma 2 OA performance? Obviously it's gamemode dependent, but I mean when it comes to hardware I've read here and there (more so than other games) that this game is quite CPU dependent.

Is this relatively true, or yet more fluff I should ignore?

I understand that when it comes to my rig, I haven't got the most super GPU out there. However I'm curios, lets say if I swap out my kit for a 3770k with a mild OC, would I get a nice performance increase? (CPU+Mobo, perhaps RAM but I can't see that being a huge "real world" performance change)

ATM on the gamemodes my pals are playing, I'm averaging around 25-35 FPS on Chernarus & 40-55 on Takistan.

These are by far, playable frame rates, although compared to other games I can play, I can see (& feel) the lower frames in comparison.

Cheers.
 
To be honest the Arma engine is just so poorly optimized and has been since the first generation, I don't think you really need to upgrade up to a 3770k especially with Arma 3 around the corner which is said to be much more optimized. You may get a slight improvement in frames, but it may not be worth the cost of the upgrade.

Edit - I believe too that it is very CPU demanding game, but also VRAM intensive too. Maybe the optimizations are down to the fact its just a slimmed down version of VBS2...

Tom
 
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Right, things that affect arma 2 performance and how they affect it from what ive experienced/researched when i was getting performance issues.

CPU - from what ive read it can use up to 8 cores (it 100% can use 6 as i see it with my hexcore) and the faster the better, i also remember way back some people got an increase in performance if they disabled hyperthreading but not everyone did... im also not sure if this got fixed in a patch or not.

RAM - it makes nearly no difference as it cant use more than 2gb because of the engine.

GPU - VRAM isnt to much of a problem, i usualy sit at around 1-1.1gb used (1.4gb in ACE with a 2k ish view distance), unless your wanting to push the view range up into the 3-4k+ range there isnt realy an issue and its a pretty moot point as vanilla arma 2 multiplayer has it capped at around 800/1000m anyway, you also want to make sure the video memory option in the advanced tab is on default at all times as it can cause some funky issues if it isnt.

SLI/Crossfire - you CAN get it working but its a major ball ache, single card i sit at 60-90% gpu usage and sli i sit at 30-50% per card and get similar fps when i have vsync off, anything roughly equivilent to a 560-580 will be more than fine at notching up the settings up a bit.

I sit at 60 FPS most of the time using these settings, only fps drop is when it loads all the textures when i first load in but it only lasts 3-8 seconds depending on the map and whats around.
Textures - very high
Terrain - very high
Post process - off
vmemory - default (funky results on anything else)
objects - very high (i turn this to very low in dayz so i can spot people camping bushes easyer at range)
anisotropic filtering - off
shadows - off (personaly i cant stand the look of them but put them on if you want)
antialiasing - high (with this OFF i acctualy get a 20-25 fps DROP)
HDR - normal
ATOC - off (personal preference, i dont see much of a performance hit if any but small bushes look way to solid for me with these on the ALL options)
PPAA - off (personal preference realy, the blur with it on is eugh so i prefer it off and being nice and sharp)

As for if you would see much of a fps gain from going from a 760 to a 3570, i doubt it id just overclock your cpu some more, throw that sucker up to 200x20 :D
 
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Thank you all for the responses.

@Tomtom565 - That's very true regarding Arma 3, and I had a hunch that the Arma 2 engine wasn't too refined somehow.

@Noz_God - I've done a slight OC on my chip from 2.8 ~ 3.6, I've never been able to get my specific chip stable at 3.8 though. I'm happy with what I've got from it already though.

@I Hunta x - Thanks for the settings layout, I practically have what you've got there after much tweaking before hand myself. As stated before, my chip doesn't like touching the 3.8 mark, and I don't like seeing the temps soar up to the 70's. I was planning on buying a relatively high-end cooler soon, perhaps I could push it a little further. I've never had the finances to support any overclocking mishaps, so although I read pieces about enthusiasts and their overclocks, I am very timid when it comes to overclocking.

Perhaps my motherboard is limiting the maximum stable clock that my chip can reach? I'm honestly clueless when it comes to telling apart an OC mobo to a 'standard user' mobo.

Back on track somewhat - I basically got my answer here, I had a niggle in my mind thinking it may be the unrefined engine, but I just wanted to see whether anyone else would mention it also.

Cheers.

Edit: I'll try whacking up the AA though, almost always wack that off instantly, (in newer games AA makes me feel sick, too.. blurry for me, but smooth for other peoples eyes)
 
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What cooler do you have? and what volts do you use for 3.6/3.8?

Nothing special, I believe it's an Arctic Freezer Pro 14 Rev 2 or something along those lines... I replaced the thermal compound about 4 months ago. (Fan profile is on silent, or standard as far as I can remember, however when I was pushing for the 3.8 I had it on the highest setting)

The temps I get are (within margin of error)
Idle 39,35,38,38
Load (100% Rendering HD Vids) nothing above 58*

Bare in mind that I use my fan controller to control my exhaust fans, gaming/load = crank them up, idle = crank em down.

Volts wise.. Just hearing that word makes me shudder, so stock which apparently is a max of 1.25 I believe, on CPU-Z it doesn't go above 1.240 V

For the most part I understand that I need to up the volts to obtain higher clocks (once you hit a wall), but I've never dared.

I was looking at getting those Zalman turbine-looking coolers - however after some reading I decided otherwise. I'm thinking on something like Phanteks PH-TC14PE. I understand that the Noctua nh-d14 + Silver arrow (I can't recall) are the top dogs, however I am a one of those who has a weakness for aesthetics.

Regarding the AA to HIGH - From the 5 minutes I was in Chernarus on the Wasteland gamemode - Almost double fps in some cases. However I'll try other servers to be sure.
I was getting roughly 40 min, 46 avg, 56 max. (Look back at what I WAS getting on Chernarus)
 
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Arma 2 isn't exactly the most optimized game :( Ive been playing since release date and haven't had any fps related issues but I have yet to test on my new rig. If any of you wanna play a game add my steam name Kotis :D
 
arma has been running like crap from day one and there wasn't much change yet. also the engine is very CPU dependent, my fx-4100 can't run dayz at a higher framerate than 30, no matter the settings.
 
veyr poorly optimized game which CAN use more than 2gb of ram if you get the settings right. the 'shader' options seems to be one of the worst thing that affects performance. WHen it was released it had massive issues with 8GB ram installs and all sorts.

Personally I'd just make the best of it, tone down view distance and shaders and whatnot and wait for 3. They reckon they'll have done SOME optimization in that version of the engine which is completely lacking in 2.
 
I find this odd as I have only some framerate issues with my system and I run it mostly on very high and I get around 65(very little going on in game to normal battle missions in multiplayer) to around 15( hosting a server of Dynamic zombie sandbox with a large amount of zombies) with the occasional drop to 5fps. The trick is with arma in my experiance is make sure that post processing is reduced quite a bit (or disable it) as it is not optimised in any shape or form and to make sure vsync is off. Vsync is pretty obvious but it does like to turn itself on in my experiance. Try that with lower graphical settings and you should hopefully see some improvement :)
 
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Ai runs off a single thread. Choke that up and no amount of PC grunt will save you. Its a serious flaw with the server ExE too as a busy mission will be killed with lag.

I run all very high with default video memory. post processing off. and AA at low/medium.

Runs smooth though im on an i7 920 with a 7970. Still It ran just as well on my 5870s

high and below shadows runs on CPU, very high on GPU. sometimes very high shadows can actually give better performance!
 
veyr poorly optimized game which CAN use more than 2gb of ram if you get the settings right. the 'shader' options seems to be one of the worst thing that affects performance. WHen it was released it had massive issues with 8GB ram installs and all sorts.

Personally I'd just make the best of it, tone down view distance and shaders and whatnot and wait for 3. They reckon they'll have done SOME optimization in that version of the engine which is completely lacking in 2.

Got a link/guide for more than 2gb ram? im interested....
 
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